what it wrongfully craves,—

Yet woe be to him who the inquiry scorns,

Do grapes grow on brambles or figs upon thorns?

Consider it well, ere the summer be past,

And the harvest be ended, with gloom at the last.

And ever this adage in memory keep,

Who sows to the wind, of the whirlwind shall reap.

The evils of Slavery to the white race, in a material sense, are clearly shown by statistics; but no one can reckon the low estate of education, religion, and morals, especially in the country-districts of the South. The larger the plantations are, the wider is the space between the white families; and an increase of the number of slaves, is no increase of exalting social intercourse. The mansion cannot escape the malaria of the hovels, nor can any one escape the just judgment of the Almighty.

Original

I Stands for Infidel. Many contemn

What you and I hold, as a riddle to them;

And sceptics are made (it is mournfully true)

By priests in the pulpit and saints in the pew,

Who torture the Gospel to get at the proof

That one man is made for another's behoof!

The Bible comes not with its quickening light.

Till conscience and reason interpret aright,

And, vainly you moan o'er the infidel fruit

While nourishing faith in the Slavery-root.

The creed should be better than the man; but what if the man be better than the creed? Business relations with the South, or friends residing there, or political clanship, may so blind men to the hideous conjunction of the Gospel and Southern Slavery, that they may profess to believe in both; but religionists grieve the Holy Spirit and chiefly make Infidels, by fastening any inhuman institution or abominable theory on the Word of God.

Original

J Stands for Justice. Whoe'er a man is,

Proclaim and defend what is rightfully his.

Content yourself not with his lawful demands,

Nor harden the links of his slavery-bands;

For all institutions are born of the dust '

Which conscience declares to be wrong and unjust.

—Will God in his majesty look to the hue

In making award of the recompense due?

Or will he in judgment be heedless or slack,

For justice withheld from the ignorant black?

Your gold and silver is cankered, and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire.... Behold, the hire of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth; and the cries of them which have reaped, are entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton: ye have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter.'"—James v. 1—3.